Great Victoria Desert vegetation, plants and wildflowers

The Great Victoria Desert is often described as a veritable botanic garden, and is the most vegetated of all Australia’s deserts. If you are fortunate to visit in spring after good winter rains, the floral displays are positively psychedelic. The desert provides an important corridor for Mallee dwellers between the east and west of the continent.

The desert is mostly a tree steppe over hummock grassland, the most distinctive tree in the desert is the statuesque marble gum Eucalyptus gonglocarpa. They grow up to 20 metres in height in deep sandy soils in the dunes and swales and in adjacent areas of the Northern Territory and Western Australia. Another statuesque tree commonly found in the desert in the black oak or belah Casuarina pauper, which occurs on gypsiferous dunes or on soils scattered with calcrete. The wind whistles through their interlocking branchlets that resemble pine needles. Malles, which are eucalypts where multiple stems grow from a singular lignotuber are widespread. Of great beauty is the flower of the Ooldea malee Eucalyptus youngiana which can be creamy yellow or bright red. The kingsmill mallee Eucalyptus kinsmillii is also very showy. There are numerous other mallees in the desert. Other trees are the native pine Callitris verrucosa and the striking desert kurrajong Brachychiton gregorii with its deep green glossy foliage that looks so out of place in the desert. Other trees include the western myall Acacia papyrocarpa which grows in open woodland with a carpet of low chenopod shrubs notably bluebush Maireana sedifolia and saltbush Atriplex vescaria. These communities are common around Emu and on the southern plains where the desert meets the Nullarbor Plain.

Other species of acacia (wattles) are found throughout the desert, include the ubiquitous mulga Acacia aneura. Of particular interest in the var. conifera, where the philodes and branches stretch out horizontally and give the tree the appearance of a Christmas tree. The umbrella bush Acacia ligulata occurs in sandy soil and on dunes as does horse mulga Acacia ramulosa. Occasionally you will see a Qandong Santalum acuminatum a member of the sandalwood family with its brightly coloured sweet and tart red fruits, or the bitter bush Pittosporum phylliraeoides with its bright yellow fruits that are bitter and inedible but provided medicinal benefit to Aboriginal people.
Whilst hakeas and grevilleas are not well represented in the desert, they make up for it in spectacular shows of inflorescence. The most widespread of the grevilleas would be the desert grevillea Grevillea juncifolia with its stunning golden orange flower. Not uncommon is the rattlepod grevillea Grevillea Stenobotyra with its creamy white spider flower and pods that rattle in the wind. Unforgettable is the grass-leaved hakea Hakea francisiana with its strikingly red bottlebush spikes of flowers.

Triodia and Pletrachne or spinifex is widespread across the desert, lobed spinifex Triodia Basedowii and porcupine grass Triodia irritans are the two most common.
Around the salt lakes and in saline areas glassworts like samphire (genus Holosarcia), bluebushes (Maireana) and saltbushes (Atriplex) thrive. Perhaps one of the most interesting plants found in the desert is the desert grass tree Xanthorrhoea thorntonii with their thick black trunks and stiff green grey pointed leaves. Aboriginal people would smoke the wood to relieve congestion. The dunes are often covered with desert thryptomene with its pretty white and red flowers. On nights of heavy dew Aboriginal people would lay their coolamons (wooden bowls) at the base of the shrub, and in the morning collect the sweet nectar by shaking the branches. The perfume of the thyptomene thryptomene maisonnewii assails the traveler, especially on dewy winter mornings.